Walker, 33, pitched well in 35.1 innings with the Phillies in 2009. In July, I was surprised a team like the Nationals, who had a weak bullpen, didn’t take a chance on him when he was designated for assignment by the Phillies. Instead, he stayed in the Phillies system and pitched well down the stretch.

Park was a huge factor in the Phillies bullpen last season, and it’s a shame the Phillies can’t bring him back. Park mentioned that he wants to start again, but he was more effective in the bullpen last season.

Golson was designated for assignment by the Texas Rangers last week. After being designated for assignment, a team has a certain amount of days to trade the player. The Rangers are trading Golson to the Yankees for Mitch Hilligoss and cash considerations.

103 Comments

i’ve been watching and reading, patiently, for about four months. time to chime in. we have a locked up team thru 2011 with the exception of werth. howard’s 260/42/125 is much more easy to replace than werth’s 270/30/100. insane, right? it’s beautiful having ryan but how many 1B’s are out there that dont strike out as much and post comparable (sp?) OBPs and SLGs? howard can leave after 2011 and be repalced by the likes of jack cust, carlos pena, adrian gonzalez or nick johnson, with little loss in production. 2012, ala the movie, will only be saved by repalcing rollins and deciding if hamels is staying. 2011 will not include werth unless there is a significant “home team” discount. RAJ understands that 25% of the roster needs to be turned over and he has intentionally left those openings in the pitching staff. unless 2012 includes anthony hewitt at SS, mark your mayan calendars.

Well as for Park, the two teams rumored to be after him, the Cubs and Rays, as I see it, do not seem to have a real need for starting pitchers. Tampa is pretty set with their starting 5. And the Cubs, have like 7 guys already in the hunt for 5 spots, with Zambrano, Lilly and Dempster pretty much set. I would bet dollars to donuts that Park ends up as a reliever no matter where he goes.

The Park situation is very frustrating to say the least. You’d think he’d want to stay with a winner like the Phillies is a role he flourished in. Oh well. I suppose it’s his loss mainly. I’d still like to see him out of the ‘pen in red pinstripes though.

The biggest problem with re-signing Park would have been money. He was asking a small fortune when the Phils decided to go a different direction. It’ll be Park’s loss, because he’s not going to get much from the Cubs or Rays, and would have been better off lowering his expectations sooner.

As for Stairs and Walker, I hope they both do well.

As for Deebo, you’ve got Howard’s RBIs wrong, Cust strikes out almost as much, Johnson is always injured and doesn’t have the same power, and Gonzales as a free agent will be getting almost as much as Howard. Pena and Cust will both likely be washed up by the time Howard’s a free agent, if they aren’t already.

If this is the kind of players you propose to replace Howard, I’d say it’d be easier to replace Werth. Even some of the Phils own minor leaguers might be able to do it. And by the way, Werth has yet to reach 100 RBIs, so you’ve got that wrong, too.

If you’re so worried about Mayan calendar predictions, bear in mind that if they come true, the entire game of baseball won’t matter.

I’d rather have Park and Walker than Baez and Durbin. Park didn’t seem too interested in re-signing, but releasing Walker and keeping Durbin is a head scratcher. Durbin hasn’t been good since early ’08.

All the best to Matt Stairs. I look forward to seeing him at all the ’08 reunions.

Matt Stairs please just retire already. A minor league contract, please. How many at bats will he get. Just retire with some respect. Phillies need to sign Werth. How can you let this guy go after this year. He is a huge part of this team. He is better then Bay. The arm, bat, running on the bases. Stealing home. Lock this guy up for three years.

They’ll let him go because, like Amaro said.. you can’t have a team where every player is making $15-20 Million per season

Howard is a Hall of Fame type player, and they’ll do all they can to keep him here for his career … Werth is a very talented player, that other teams will be willing to outbid us for …. I think he’s gone after this year

didn’t someone say park wants to start b/c korea (his home country) won’t televise a game unless they know he will be in it? if he is a reliever they won’t know what game he will be in, so they don’t televise any of them.

Ben – correct. I can’t blame Park for wanting to be a starter, unfortunately, he’s not that good at it. Either way, he’ll remain in the big leagues, just at a lower salary, less competitive team. He probably more than makes up for it with S. Korea endorsements.

Don M, a truly chilling link. While Philly doesn’t have wall street money, it’s not Detroit either. They could probably increase tix $ by 30% more and still sell out most games. While Deebo could use a fact checker (or maybe a new mix of meds), the intent is there – need young, cheap turnover – if not 25%, at least 3 or 4 guys on 25 man roster.

If he just realized that he’s awful in that role…and understood that he has a demand…and a future….in the bullpen….he probably would be courted by more teams….including the Phillies.

If the Phillies increased ticket prices 30%…that would be disastrous for the “average Joe” fan….that wants to bring his family to a few games a year…and not feel as though he’s being raped in the process.

The problem with draft picks is that only something like 30% of 1st round draft picks ever reach the Major Leagues (and lesser chance for picks from lower rounds)

Which is why so many teams would rather trade a player for PROSPECTS (guys that are closer to making the big leagues already).. instead of letting players walk away as Free Agents only to get draft picks in return

Mets aren’t done yet, so I’d qualify it as the dumbest move to date. I thought Sheets would get a cheap contract with a ton of incentives. Could be the price of playing for a team with little talent or hope, an aging stadium, and ugly uniforms.

I don’t have a problem with Sarge jr for $2M, but they did give up one of their few decent bullpen arms in Stokes (would you take jr for $2M and Durbin?). On a whole, a fair to poor deal, not terrible.

Trading for Matthews comes in as a stupid move because the Mets don’t need him. They have Pagan to play in place of Beltran for the first month or so. The $2 million might have helped pay for a decent #2 starter.

Signing Sheets could actually work out, though. Incentives would have been better, but $10 million is peanuts if he pitches like he’s capable of pitching.

And since the Mets were also bidding on Sheets,too, this should be considered a very good signing to Phils fans.

Say Sheets has a good first half and the A’s trade him. They pay for a half a season of him and could possibly get some prospects out of this deal. I’m betting that is part of the plan and if their a competing team, then it pays dividends too. Price might have been a little high, but you never know…

Interesting take on the Sheets deal. I don’t get the A’s. I mean what are they trying todo? They bring in a big name player like Holliday last year or Sheets and then get rid of them. I also see the A’s as a retirement place for baseball players that were once GOOD but are average now like Jason G who is now with the Rockies. I am not sure about their farm system though. I know they have Mike Taylor now but has anyone heard of a big player in the farm system that was or is like the Chase Utley. But i see that they have some stuff to move forward like their ROY closer, i forget the name of him. But The A’s are one of those teams i dont see what they are doing.

we’ll sign werth, he wants to play here. brown will replace ibanez, because i hear he’s not ready.

i wanted michael brown, he’s going to win rookie of the year in the AL next year, he’s ready to go right now so letting him go cemented us to jayson werth. brown can’t replace werth, he’s the only righty! sorry chooch

shoudlnt have moved sooo many prospects ruben, now you gotta pay for veterans. i’m excited for phillipe aumont but that is NOT enough for all the names you shipped away. i saw a blueclaws comeback this season involving travis d’naud, he’s a doubles kinda guy. and don’t get me started on knapp.

i think this season is about revenge. i think the target it off the back this season, everyone got their own little punch in the gut @ some point, even cliff got hit. HK passed away this season, i mean STUFF WENT WRONG. and charlie says halladay is a “tad” better than lee because when he doesn’t have his stuff, he can work with it and he always wants to get 9. im always for the phillies in their move of cliff and hate bringing it up, but check this out…

hamels myers blanton moyer park

HALLADAY hamels blanton happ….moyer?

lol for moyer. I love the guy but come on, come on. i cannot have high hopes for him. looking at opening day 2010, the fire has been rekindled. this team is so good that even playing bad they the best in the NL. 100 wins this season! raul do good and make people proud, and lets have high hopes

and if it’s true the mets signed matthews for 2 year/ 2 mil, Y DID THE PHILS NOT SEE THAT! one reason- so sarge could say Cadillac time for his own son! if he says it for him while he plays for the mets, i’m blowing up the booth while he and mccarthy are in it.

merril reese could do baseball…..i mean joe buck can do it, and he sucks!

the main challenge for the phillies is clearly winning the playoff series against a NY, Boston, etc. thus the rotation must be shut down, and depending on the maturity of players like hamels and happ is a risk within itself. based on lee’s playoff performance last year, the replacement of halladay into the playoff rotation is essentially a non-factor. that being said, winning another world championship rests on the maturity increases in existing starters. Perhaps there was not much of a way around this unless increasing ticket prices or adjusting costs etc to sign both long-term Lee and Halladay. But in this case, you lose much of the farm system. To work around this situation, I would have just kept Lee long term for 4 years negotiated, and signed Ben Sheets as a dark horse. That way, you still have Drabek in the wings to make a possible impact for the nearer-term rotation, and a star and fan favorite in Lee, then finally the potential for Hamels to rebound and Blanton/Happ to improve. Perfect world, loyal organization. This also frees up extra cash in signing Lee instead to help a bit for the cost of a Sheets (7-12 M).

I would suggest Kendrick/Contreras in the fifth slot. Moyer might not even play that much. He’s hurt, he’s having 23 surgeries in the offseason. If I’m RAJ, I tell him to get ready to pitch one inning at a time because he may be our lefty out of the pen. At 47, or whatever, I don’t see how he can bitch about this. I think he can be effective, I mean, if you believe in the “change of pace” guy, isn’t he the ultimate?

Man the Sheets signing really blew me away, 10 million never thought he would get near that,and incentives for more. I know longer can say what players are worth after this one, my son always say there is a ass for everyseat and he is right, why would you pay him that kind of money , and to mention Detroit ,they spend big money in the draft and our near or above us in players salary. I still dont see brown as a replacement for werth, no power, not a good outfielder, for ibanez yes but not near a werth type player. I still believe ibanez wont be a big asset to us this year hope I am wrong.

Sheets won’t be very good trade bait at $10 million/year. He could bring back, at most, some pretty low level prospects unless he’s pitching completely lights-out. If he’s doing that well, it puts the A’s in contention, and they would have no reason to trade him.

Moyer may still prove an adequate starter or middle relief guy. I doubt he’d be a left-handed specialist, not due to lack of effectiveness, but because it takes too long for him to warm up, and he probably can’t go on back to back days.

Keeping Lee long term may not have been doable, and Ben Sheets as a “dark horse” would have cost too much given that the Phils got money back in the Halladay trade. Therefore, ActuallyChilled, there would have been no extra cash. Also, from what I’ve read, Aumont has better stuff than Drabek; he’s just a little further away from the majors. It costs prospects to get proven talent, so sometimes proven talent has to be traded to get the prospects back: prospects for Halladay, Lee for prospects. It may seem like a wash, but Halladay, according to EVERYONE, is the better pitcher.

I’d put Vic before Ibanez (would possibly generate a few more runs, allow Victorino to slap hit vs trying to drive in runs, give him a chance to run more without having to slow up for Ibanez, give Ruiz more RBI ops, but I don’t think it would change the overall record much). Charlie is a master at reading guys, knowing what will get the best out of them.

I don’t think the Sheets contract would have effected Blanton much either way. I don’t blame guys who chase the money, but think that Blanton likes playing here, wanted some stability. He probably lives in a log cabin in the middle of nowhere, figured a 3 year contract sets him up for life. If he has the desire to keep going after the contract is up, can go for another contract, otherwise, spend the rest of his life fishing. A month until pitchers/catchers report?

Sheets signed with Oakland. Billy Bean is all about trading for or signing guys that he can turn around and trade at the deadline. If Sheets is pitching well he will absolutely be worth a lot. Even at 10 mil, by the time the deadline comes around the season will be more than half over, so the team taking him on won’t have to pay that much. Especially if they can trade someone on their current roster away to try and offset the coast.

You don’t think a healthy Sheets will be valuable to a team that is in contention for a playoff spot? I do.

There are easily a half dozen fringe playoff teams that could benefit greatly from one more good starting pitcher. Sheets can be dominant when he is healthy. The A’s even with Sheets pitching lights out are not better than the Rangers and Mariners. The Angels lost a lot of guys but I would not be shocked to see them in the thick of it until the end.

As for Lee, apparently no one wants this to die down. Amaro was not going to offer Lee more than three years. Lee was offered and rejected the very same deal that Halladay accepted. If Lee had accepted the 3 year @ 60 million deal then he would still be here. He rejected it and the Phillies moved on. Once Lee or Lee’s agent turned the deal down then they knew that at best they would get Lee for one year and then two picks out of it. Which may or may not ever turn into an ML ready player. With Halladay on board they knew that they had to restock the farm as best they could. Who knows, a year or two from now some of the guys they got in the Lee trade could end up playing huge roles for them. And if that is the case then the Lee trade looks that much better.

The Skinny: If Phillippe Aumont was the pitching prospect with the best stuff in Roy Halladay-Cliff Lee deal, then Drabek is the one with the best combination of stuff and polish. He’s undersized, but the 22-year-old has the stuff, bloodlines and feel for pitching to perform at the top of a big-league rotation. Aside from some lingering makeup concerns, Drabek is very close to the total package.

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The Skinny: Brown is often described as a scout’s dream. He has a frame reminiscent of Darryl Strawberry’s, and while his power probably won’t reach those heights, he has tools galore. The on-the-field results have caught up to the tools in a hurry, but he’s not a finished product.

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The Skinny: The best pure arm, and the player with the most upside in the Halladay-Lee blockbuster, was Aumont. He is not as far along in his development as Kyle Drabek but the raw stuff stacks up with anyone. Armed with a 92-95 mph heavy sinking fastball and a four-seamer he can sit at 94-98 mph with, the 6-foot-7 Canadian can get by on arm alone. Couple that with his plus breaking ball at 79-83 mph and Aumont has two pitches that could make him a downright dominant force.

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The Skinny: The 6-foot-6, athletic outfielder has the type of talent that can help a team in all facets. He has 30-homer power potential and the ability to steal 20-30 bases in the majors. He has improved vastly in the last two seasons, and appears ready to start in the majors out of spring training in 2010.

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The Skinny: The Phillies’ scouting department has long been in favor of drafting athletes, and few athletes are as intriguing as Gose. Blessed with blistering speed that grades out as an 8 tool on the 2-8 scouting scale, Gose has the skills to wreak havoc on the basepaths. His times to first base are consistently under four seconds. Very few players come along that have the skills to be an elite big-league base-stealer, but he is one of them. He also shows an outstanding, plus throwing arm in center field. As far as his skills at the plate, he’s still quite raw.

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The Skinny: The world met Gillies at last year’s Futures Game, as he not only impressed with his inspiring story but also his potentially game-changing skills. Few players in the minors have the speed of Gillies, and he has the range to be a Gold Glove-caliber center fielder. The offense has continued to improve — the 21-year-old had a fantastic 2009 campaign, hitting .341 with nine home runs and 44 stolen bases.

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None of the prospects moved in the Lee deal got mentioned anywhere in this list, in fairness I think Jason Knapp was highly-rated last year, but battled injury with probably made him fall back this year

I think fanhouse is pretty new.. but they have legit sportwriters working for them

I just thought that was interesting because everyone was burrying Aumount …. but before the deal went down, I listened to Jayson Stark and ?? someone else saying that Aumount is young, big, with a TON of potential

and that Gillies is a contact hitter who can FLY .. (which is why I said before that maybe he’ll turn into a Victorino type one day)

We’re young right now… with some decent prospects climbing the ladder. I really wish we had more legit pitching prospects on the way though, but I think Flande can be really good under the right coaching

I saw him last year keeping the ball extremely low in the zone.. inducing ground balls etc.. it would be nice to have a more talented Kyle Kendrick type coming up in the system.. since you need #4 and #5 pitchers on your roster too

You can see he had an extraordinarily high BABIP. If you normalize that (clicking “Luck” in the top right corner) his slash stats fall to a more pedestrian .295/.391/.421. Still excellent, and with his speed that’s a great line if he can sustain it, but he’s not a .350 hitter.

That said! I do think he’s worth getting excited over. He’s not on Dom Brown’s level, but he could be very exciting.

Proves the hit on the far was marginal and the front office did their due dilligence. I think in the back of the minds of the front office they probably said are we likely to get back to the WS a third straight year, and would anything else but winning outweigh the chances of securing a 3 window window to win plus a possible further window past that…

No longer can this deal be looked at as Halladay vs Lee & the prospects, it’s now Halladay plus all the guys that have been locked up.

—

Boy did Golson’s value fall off a cliff in a hurry…

Good luck to Thome, glad he gets a chance to finish things off with some dignity instead of festering as a glorified pinch-hitter.

You take a teams top pitching and 2nd highest positional prospect and a guy some consider better than both AND lock up 4/5th’s of your rotation under market value, for a would have been nice and no guarantee we’d get a pick in the top 30…

Keith Law ranked the minor league systems and the Phils came in at 24th overall.

“They kept their best prospect, Domonic Brown but traded everyone else, and their next wave of impact guys largely spent 2009 in short-season ball. The Lee trade with Seattle restored some depth between Brown and the Anthony Goses and Sebastian Valles of the system.”

4 guys in the top 50 prospects? Sounds like a pretty good farm system. I know prospects are always a gamble, but how do the top Fangraph prospects pan out? Do they have a decent history of picking solid MLB players?

I try to get to a few Pigs games every year, follow some of the younger guys, but don’t know much about the lower level farm except for what I read here and there. Outfield and pitching are the shorter term needs, but do the Phils have any low level infield prospects with potential?

I mentioned this last month and got poo poo’d. Tyson Gillies batted .341 last year with 44 steals and a high OBP. Someone said, “Yeah, but he was in a hitters league”. I don’t give a damn. Correct me if I’m wrong but hitters leagues are primarily called that because of the climate, thin air v. thick air, etc. I wouldn’t imagine that it would affect singles hitter, i.e. Gillies, less than it helps the power guys like Eric Karros and all those Dodger guys from the PCL who hit 64/185/.388 in AAA. Gillies is a .321 career hitter, no matter where he plays, and the Phillies reportedly wanted him over the other guy, I forget his name already. I see him as a Michael Bourne type….but with hearing.

The Dipsy

P.S. The A’s are delusional for signing Sheets to that contract.
P.S.S. N.J.- Where ya been?

There are always differences of opinion regarding prospects. Thats why people like Shane Victorino or Johan Santana become rule 5 picks. I’ll go by the Phils’ scouts’ opinions. They seem to have done a pretty good job picking out the core of this team, so there’s no reason to think they flubbed up in scouting Aumont, Gillies, and Ramirez.

Golson turned out to be one of a few duds that every team drafts. The Phils caught on, and actually got a player for him, which is more than the Rangers got. Mayberry might turn out to be a dud, too, but he’s shown enough so far to not be designated for assignment. That’s a credit to the Phils’ scouts, too.

Mayberry is really good at hitting fastballs …. so look for him to hit a couple HR’s early in Spring Training again …..and then once pitchers start mixing-in all their pitches, he’ll start striking out

Picking up on something said earlier about the Mets they’ve screwed themselves, I hear rumblings they might move Pagan. They have to play Francour because their not moving Beltran to right, they can’t play Bay in right so what are they going to do… Put Matthews Jnr’s arm in RF…?

Power can develop, but average happens pretty quickly in the majors. If you can’t pick up a breaking ball, you’re outed pretty quickly, and it’s not something that really can be learned (you either have the eye or don’t). While some guys grow into power (even pre PEDs – Schmidt started out in the minors as a switch hitting slap hitter),you don’t see many who come up with a 220 average develop into a 320 hitter. Mayberry is an AAA+ player, a nice safety valve for a week or so, defensive replacement, but not a regular big leaguer. Pitchers with good breaking balls don’t stay in the minors long, so that weakness often isn’t identified until call-up time.

Never heard of fanhouse . go to baseball america, for player evaultion. Aumont is not a top prospect because he has a hip condition, which he is downplaying but limited his innings, Gose also throws a 97 miles a hour fastball, but doesnt want to pitch unless he gets his shot at regular position. gillies has speed but so does a lot of toolsy outfielders, he hit in a hitter league, and a lot of his hits were infield hits, which scouts said when he moves up to double aa he wont get, ramirez is a arm who showed nothing, you can build these guys up all you want, but they werent top prospects going into this year, at one time aumont was, but now he is a suspect prospect.

deebo with all due respect sir, that could have been the least intelligent post i’ve seen on this website to date. howard had an outstanding 2009…he trimmed down, improved his defense, struck out less often, stole a few more bases, raised his batting average. this man is the most powerful hitter in professional baseball and has become one of the best clutch hitters in the game recently and you suggest replacing him with jack cust? jack freaking cust? watch what happens if we do end up losing “the big piece”…maybe then you will understand what ryan brings to this team

AND i didn’t even think to mention his infamous super-hot streaks that he goes on from time to time. this guy turns it on and he doesn’t just help the team win, he puts 24 other men and uncle charlie on his back and carries them to victory.